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A SERMON 



DELIVERED IN 



CHKIST CHUECH, NEW OKLEANS. 



THE PRESIDENT'S DEATH: 

A MEMORIAL SEKVICE, 

HELD AT THE REQUEST OF THE 

OFFICERS OF THE ARMY AND NAVY. 



BY REV. S. C. THRALL, D. D., 

Rector of the Church of the Redeemer, New York. 



THE PRESIDENT'S DEATH 

A NATIONAL RESPONSIBILITY. 

THE PRESIDENT'S CHARACTER 

A TREASURE OF MEMORY. 



A SERMON 



DELIVERED IN 



CHRIST CHURCH, NEW ORLEANS, 



Suiiilay Morning, April 23, 1865, 



AT A MEMORIAL SERVICE HELD TO THAT CHURCH, ON THE REQUEST OF THE 



OFFICERS OF THE ARMY AND NAVY. 



BY REV. 8. C. THIIA.LI., D. D., 

Rector of the Church of the Redeemer, New York. 



NEW ORLEANS: 

Printed at Kea's Steam Press, 48 Magazine street. 

1865. 



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Knr Orixuis, April 27, 186S. 
To Tini OrnaiRS of toe Ahmt a»» Navt is New Omm-vs : 

Ymir Oinmittic bolievlng that tho Address delivered »l Christ Church, by the Reverend S. C. 
Tdrall, D. P., onSunilny, the 2M iostant, in mi'incirial of the tragic death of your late Com- 
manderln-Chlof, the I'rcsldent of the United states, contains a truththl analysis of his character, 
and pays a Just tribute to the admirable traits of bis bead and heart ; and that you would de- 
sire to preserve a record In some permanent form , of the action you took in honor of his memory ; 
and in order that your brother oCQcers, who wore unable to participate in the solemnities of the 
occasion, may In some measure enjoy the same pleasure In reading that you did in hearing the 
Address, have, at the suggestiou of llie pri'sonl, ami also of the former t'onmuuiJIng Generil of 
the Department of the Gulf, olHained a copy for publication us here printed. 

Tlio notice of the service Ukcn (Tom the I'icayune, au.l the correspuudenee between y.)ur Com- 
mittee and the Rev. Dr. Taiuu., published with the Address, expkins their action, and the deep 
interest manifested by the Rector, Wardens, Vestry, and Members of Oiriat Cliurch, in an event 
that has drowned a nation and the wliolu world in tears— clad your country in the habilimcnla of 
sorrow, and your heart.s in mourning. 

E. n. BROWS, Brigadier General Volunteers. 

E. G. IIECKWITH, Colonel C. S. Army. 

G. F. EMMONS, Captain U. S Navy. 



"Behold I will do a thing in Israel at which hoth the ears ol «<»ery oni 
that bearelb it shall tiogle." — 1 Sam. Ill, 2. 




SERMO]Sr 



This day, in the order of the Church, we should fill up the octave 
of glorious Easter with holy joy. We gather here with sad and 
sorrowing hearts instead. A great calamity turns us from the 
wonted course. A nation's loss begets a nation's wail. A stupen- 
dous crime, base in its origin, ignoble in its cowardice, barbarous 
in its execution, has proved sadly fatal in its termination. It came 
to all, a crushing, stupefying bhjw. It hoped to paralyze a nation's 
head, and, like all such folly, it failed. Jt reached the man but not 
the office. " The powers that be are ordained of God," and hu- 
man malignity can never harm what Grod wills shall stand. It hoped 
to break a nation's life — it quickened every pulse anew. It elec- 
trified the nation's nerve and hardened every sinew into steel. I 
had not thought such folly could consort with such malignity. 

Even the man it injured not. Death is the common lot — a few 
hours earlier or later is of small consideration to a noble soul ; and 
to be embalmed in the amber of a nation's memory and love while 
time shall last, were worth the cutting short a few days more or 
less. The poor fool sought revenge, and with vaulting ambition 
so o'erreached himself that he gave earthly immortality of honor to 
his victim. As intemperate indulgence destroys the sense it grati- 
fies, so crime defeats the end proposed. 

But my purpose is not to moralize on crime, or on this occasion 
to deduce the many lessons which this act teaches. Still less would 
I waste words on so ignoble a subject as the criminal. The just 
loathing and contempt in which all sane men hold the crime and 
criminal, need no stimulant, and for them, language affords no ex- 
pression. The act startles as though the world's Christian civiliza- 
tion had rolled some ages backward. God grant it may not be an 
omen of such portent. God grant that it bear no seeds of repro- 



duction. This I fear ; for Sin has terrible fecundity and germina- 
ting power only less than Deity ; as is witnessed by the world's 
whole history. All crime has developed from the germinating 
fecundity of that one sin by which Eve first transgressed the law. 

And this thought leads me n-.iturally to a subject which it is my 
duty, on this occasion, briefly lo discuss. It was the wise saying 
of a heathen moralist that he could not consider any man as alien to 
himself The truth which heathen philosophy thus taught. Revela- 
tion hath established on firmer ground, by showing us all derived 
from one original, all joined in the brotherhood of blood, first flow- 
ing to every human beinsj, before his birth, from the pulsation of a 
mother's heart. It is a subtle lie of unity, incapable of analysis, 
still more incapable of rupture. As then in tlie heroic deeds of a 
noble man all men are dignified, because lie is part of tiiem, and 
they of him, so too in every deed of deep malignity each man has 
part. We would then forget the tie. But if we glory in the good, 
as having pait in them, so too we must remember we bear part in 
the evil. Each man has pait in every crime. It is a truth of na- 
ture, birth, in which is bound up our highest hopes. This tie of 
unity of the race, by blood, binds us to redemption in the Son of 
God. 

This is true in another sense.* No sin descends lower llian the 
social state permits. There is a certain moral density and com- 
pactness which holds bad men up, and according to this density 
will crimes descend and no farther. In the formation of this moral 
density of the social state, every man bears part in proportion to 
the toughness of his moral fibre. In each crime, then, and for its 
commission, every man bears his resj)onsibi1ity. It may be small, 
but it is real. It bears exact proportion to tiie man's power to 
form the moral atmosphere, according to his social position ami in- 
tellectual gifts. This very crime is at once proof and ilbi^tralion. 
Whence comes it but from the moral upheaval and convul>ion of a 
great civil war with which God has chastened a nation's sin, and 



• Thl!* sense Is not ditTerenl from, ami <IoultU<»ss grows of and Is founUod on Uio nibor. U U 
from the tie of blooil that binds us in unity, tliiU inakr^ us one, each m;in, p;irt of an unbroken 
whole, thai the ovulenl moral influence of man on his fellow cninca. That is but a shallow 
pUllusopby which rosu it in a fon<lness for imitation or aiiiniratiou only, and nut In afflnit>' and 
llkeiifs? Id the tie of a common blocl. It mtghl bo easily demonstrated, if time an«I simce 
|» riiiill" I. 



immorality and forgetfulness of Himself. This is clear to all. It 
begat the hatred which culminated in the assassination We abhor 
the crime. We do well. We do l)etter, to repei.t of our part of 
the irreligion, sin and immorality, without which the crime had 
been impossible. This sin calls for our humiliation, confession, 
repentance and amendment. As surely as we forget this, so surely 
in an unchanged moral atmosphere this act will germinate to re- 
production, which mere abhori ence of the crime can no way check. 
1 doubt not the actor had once hs great and just abhorrence of the 
crime as we, yet it withheld him not. We do well then to remem- 
ber that no criminal is alien to us, and no crime foreign to our 
moral responsibility to God. I press this as the lesson of the oc- 
casion ; most urgent for our safety as a nation, most important to 
our Chribtian character. 

The nation is called not only to repentance for a crime which 

rests on it, but to mourp a great loss — its chief head. I am set to 

civc utterance to your lamentation, when I have not found words 

in which to tell my own grief I, with bleeding heart, am set to 

bind up yours. I lament not the lack of time for preparation, brief 

thouo-h it was, but I bewail the incapacity of expression, which no 

time will remedy. Giiefismost eloquent in -silence This, if it 

might be, would suit me best. When the Master agonized in the 

garden till his sweat was blood, how few his words. How in silent 

wonder did his followers sympathize. He was most ready to 

speak who used words for thrice denial. I cannot express — no 

words can— the thrill of agony that fell upon my heart, when the 

mind, stupefied by the first shock of the intelligence, awoke to 

know its truth ; how a faint sickness fell upon me, as though it had 

come from my own distant household, so nearly did it touch me. 

How weariness, as of long watching, fell upon my frame, and I 

yearned for quiet rest, which yet I could not find — that strange, 

nervous paradox of irritable restless exhaustion, equally incapable 

of action and repose ; that conflicting desire of friendly sympathy 

and solitude. I cannot tell your grief, I cannot tell my own ; you 

felt it I felt it. We understand each other by subtler medium 

than words, as when brothers gather in the home made desolate by 
a father's loss, and mourn in silent sympathy; heart answering se- 
cretly to heart's secret utterance. In such a scene they tell not 



their sorrow each to tlie othor. But after sacred silence duly- 
kept, how grateful when some voice in tender accents tells his 
goodness, declares his generous acts, recounts his iiohlo deeds, 
lovingly recalls in wdrd-painting, his form and figure, and the 
lineaments of his face, weaving into memory, through language, the 
cherished memorials of his character and person. Such is one duty 
of this occasion. There arc those who wouhi not eulogize the 
dead. But they are hard, unsympathetic natures, of so severe a 
mould that they are shocked with loving witness, sometimes false, 
and the fond exaggeratioiis of tender hearts. Not such, David's 
nature, as witness his lamentation of Saul and Jonathan.* How 
grandly does he weave their i)ettcr deeds into heroic song for 
memorial of them to all time, nohly forgetful of faults and errors. 
In this work of charity I lament both lack of faculty, and time for 
right usance of what I have. I would tliat I could justly honor 
the memory of him who, in times of trouble, danger, and peril, has 
won a fame that in the coining ages will shine above all his official 
predecessors, and need fear eclipse from none who follow after. 
Incapable of what I would, 1 cheerfully, at the request of the offi- 
cers of the army and navy who have lost their late chief, do what 
I may, and gladly bring my simple wreath of fhiwers, of wild and 
wayward growth, to lay with my homage on his tomb. 

Having slight, though fondly-remembered personal acquain- 
tance with Mr. Lincoln, I can only touch upon the more public 
elements of his character. Of his political course, I have no right 
to speak in this sacred place — as little have I inclination or desire. 
On such things men may fairly differ. It is of the more essential 
characteristics of his being that I propose to speak. 

These first find utterance in the frame, the figure, and the 
countenance. He was a stalwart man, rather sinewy than mus- 
cular, and, as it seemed, all formed for use. He looked less 
capable of fatigue than any man I ever knew — perhaps the only 
public man of the time capaiile of the tug and strain and wear 
of this most eventful period. The countenance laid as little claim 
to mere beauty, as the frame did to grace, yet it was most ex- 
pressive. The square angle of the lower jaw showed the great 

• 2d Samuel, 1. 13 Ui eml of c-liapter, wliich was Uif Orel lessoo, id the Morning Prayer, 
Kolected (br \\f >H-<'^-[iin 



vital energy, which relaxed its hold on the body, only hours after 
an injury which, to most raen, would have proved fatal in as 
many minutes. I think I never saw a face from which it was so 
easy to get a likeness that all would recognize, and yet would so 
little represent the man, in his entireness. It was wonderfully 
mobile and expressive. It would give longer study, to fairly 
embody all in one portrait, than any other I have met. None 
will truly know that face who did not study it in life. One artist 
only in a thousand could fairly represent it. It was phases only 
which a picture of him shows. 

The brief acquaintance I had with him, gave me small oppor- 
tunity to know his intellect from personal observation. To judge 
him by his writings, his face fairly typified his mind. It was 
like all the man, for use and not display. I have never read 
English, at once so rhetorically faulty, and so incapable of mis- 
construction and misapprehension. The style was far from clear, 
though sometimes vigorous. The thought and meaning was un- 
mistakable. In the many state papers he composed, intimately 
related to constitutional law, and foreign rights in most intricate 
complexity; I am told, by professional men, that his proclamations 
needed in very small degree the constraint of judicial interpreta- 
tion. In the times he passed through, not to have wholly failed 
was evidence of great good sense ; to have succeeded, as he did, 
was demonstration of great wisdom. In nothing did he more 
manifest his intellectual greatness than when he confessed he had 
no plan or theory for the difficulties with which his administration 
was surrounded. He had better. He held great principles, and 
applied them as the occasion demanded. The past four years, 
God has been working in this land with wondrous manifestations. 
An ordinary man, with a pet scheme and theory, would have as 
much deranged the work of God as is it is permitted to such 
men. He was evidently a great man, providentially raised up for 
a great occasion. 

He was an honest man. I use the word in its largest sense, as 
describing that quality in man by which he is just, in harmony 
with justice. He won the title before he gained the Executive 
chair ; and, in the midst of unusual temptation, he wore it with 
as small assoil as often comes to the most favored men. It is the 



10 SERMON. 



noble title which will ever be associated with his name and 
memory. It is one of the noblest mun can win. I am told by 
ono who knew him well — one whom he trusted fully — tliat when 
urged to change, his answer was, in his own vigorou.s Saxon, " My 
word is out." He realized that the word once -spoken cannot by 
any power be unsaid. It was the end of argument. Slow to 
speak, the word once spoken was to him a law, so far as his own 
policy and action was concerned. 

Ho was a man of rare fidelity, as an honest man must be. A 
man of fidelity is a man of faith, who trusts in God and His 
providence. Settled in certain fixed principles, he showed a most 
sublime confidence. No hour so dark but he went bravely on. 
If he saw but one step before him, that step he took, then waited 
for the way to open for the next. When Saul of Tarsus, blinded 
by the vision which brought him to faith in Christ, asked, " Lord, 
what wilt tViou have me to do .' " the answer was, " Go into the 
city." There was no revelation of his future work, its magnitude 
or its success. It was a grand faith which obeyed this and asked 
no more — which did the present simple duty and waited for the 
next direction. Somewhat of the same fidelity, in aifairs of state, 
was the late President's. He went as fast and as far as the way 
was clearly open ; and in the darkness, with calm trust waited on 
the future. 

Mr. Lincoln was a man of integrity. 1 use the word, not as of 
honesty, but in the true meaning of Entireness — completeness. 
He was not part of a man, but a whole, entire, rounded man — 
a man of well-balanced character. It is shown in his bearing in 
the dark days of the republic, and in the later days of hope- 
fulness. There was as little of dispair in the one case, as of 
hopeful exultation in the other. In the last lialf of the year 
1862, and the first part of 1863, there seemed small hope. Men 
of stout heart quailed. The nation saw the darkest days of all 
the past. In two years war there was small token of success. 
The effort to conquer peace seemed to many, to have signally 
failed. He gave no sign of fear or doubt. He quietly appealed 
anew for men and moans, as necessary to the time. At his late 
inauguration all was changed. He congratulated the nation on 
success with no more confidence than he had appealed to it in 



SERMON. 



11 



failure. It was a sublime trust in truth and equity, joined with a 
sweet humility and patience. It was more confidence in a 
nation's woi'th than in his own discretion. It is only great 
natures that can in trial thus throw themselves in confidence on 
God and on their fellows, and triumph without exultation. 

He was a loving man. He showed it in a winsomeness of feature 
and of manner, by which you approached him freely, not, however, 
without a feeling of reverence. Too great for envy, and guileless 
of malice, he gave generous confidence to those who differed from 
him and his policy, if they were but ready to serve the nation. 
He trusted honestly, as he would be trusted. For those whom 
justice compelled him to constrain, with all the power legitimately 
in his hand, that the nation saw no harm, he bore no evil will ; he 
harbored no revenge. Obedience to law he must needs compel : 
That done, he asked no more. Their error he thought more 
one of the head than of the heart. Justice he must secure. 
Mercy he loved to exercise. His last counsel with his advisers 
was for clemency. His last purpose was to pardon. 

God and good angels love such charity. 'Tis born of Him — 
akin to them. As the fondest memory of the departed, let us 
cherish this feature of his character. Greater than his power, 
nobler than his wisdom, let us make it the mark of our affection — 
the bright example of our imitation. 



t 



THE ARMY AND NAVY AT CHRIST CHURCH. 



*" Vom Iho Xew Orleans Daily PIcayuno, April 25, 186ft.J 

AccordlnR to previous ftrrnugemcut, the OWV'on of the Army and Navy stationed in thl« 
IV virtmcnl attmi<Ied (.'hrist Cluirch on Sunday morning, in full uniform, (iatheruig at the City 
Hall at half past ten, tlioy procffUml in a body to tin- Cliurch, ht-adod by General Bjinkfi an.l 
Admiral Tliatcber. The disploy M Ihoy entered Uin sacred fdillce and imssod up the broad ftisl<- 
to their seatf;, tilling the entire central [lart of the building, was louching and imi>u^iug — the organ 
meanwhile ^'Iviug forth a soft and solomn dirge. 

The Cliurch Is superbly drapi^td in mourning. The altar table id coTOred with black cUiUi, and 
behind it is a high screen, formed i>f heavy folds of hlaclt ilrapery, Imrdered at the top wiili wliito 
lac«' fi'stoou<. The dcHk and pulpit are fully shrouded in black, and the chancel rail- are very 
tastefully hung with the 8amo, and fringed with white. Tho murblo font, which, on the previous 
Sunday (Kasier), we saw so beautiful in itti sumptnon-* array of spring flowers, It; now hnng with 
.mbleni!? of mourning. The eohnnus are wreathed with re^toons of Mack and white crape and 
hico, and the |>orch is literally canoplod with Hugs. Ovor the uvUn entrance to iLc Church there 
I.S a handsome display of appropriate mourning. 

Tlie services of tlio day were arranged to null the solemn occasion. Of course, the Cftllen, 
EpiHtle and GosiM'I for Sunday aft Kastor, were read. Hut in saying the Morning Prayer, Rev. 
Mr. Clmbbuck and his a.s.-*istanl i'rosbyter made some variations from the usual nnh-r. Tli- 
llrst lesiion was that t-mching |K.rtion of tho first chapter of II Fftmuot, in which Davit! lamonl.-i 
tUe death ot Saul and Jonathan : "The beauty of I.-racl is slam upon his high places ; how a^ 
the mighty fallen ! Tell it not in Galh, publish it ma in tlie streets of Askelon I How are tin' 
mighty fallen In tho midst of the battle, and the we«[Mins of war perished 1 " etc. The second 
lesson was that immortal argument of St. Paul to the Corintliians (1st Cor. XV) iu support of l!i. 
dotrlrine of tho rcfurrection from the dead. 

The I'salms selected, iu.st*_'ftd of thoso for tho day, were the 31^1, " In Tliee. Ijord, have 1 
put my trust," and tho 13th, " Out of tho deep have I called unto Tliec." The Prayers " For :i 
sick person," and " For a person in affliction," the (Iret being sm-cially used with reference t" 
the Secretary of State, and t!ie last to the ix-ople of tho Vnited States and tho family of the lat 
I'resideDt, were said in the proper place. Tlio introductory sentences before the K.'chorlatii'n 
were tliose with which tho burial service commences : '* I am the re-^urrection and the- life," etc 

The music was very tonchiiigly performed by a well-balanced choir. Previous t^» the com 
mencement of Morning Prayer, Uiat beauUfnl air of Pacsiello, " Come, ye disconsolate," wa- 
beautifully sung. Instead of tho *' Venite," the anthem from the 30th and OOlh Psalms, from th>- 
burial aorvice, " 1/ird, lot mo know my end," was sung to a plain chant with great rxpressioi 
The canticle. " all yo works of tho Lord 1 " tho Song of the Three Holy Children, which the> 
sang ad they walkeil in the midst of the fire, wa** chanleil In the place of the '• Te I>eum," and 
the " Bono'lictus," Instead of the " Jubilate." The Introlt was from tho 86th Psalm, *' Bow 
down thine ear, O Lord, and hear me," to which was finely adapted the beautiful music of tli- 
prayer In *' Moise." The liymn woa tho 160th, *< When gathering clouds around I view." 







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